


the long long night (the streak of dawn)

by Damkianna



Category: Dark Matter - Michelle Paver
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Gen, M/M, Psychological Horror, Recovery, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-19 20:19:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13131396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Damkianna/pseuds/Damkianna
Summary: Jack is rescued—and then wakes up back in the cabin. AU from right before the final entry, sort of: Jack gets a chance to make things turn out differently.





	the long long night (the streak of dawn)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MildredMost](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MildredMost/gifts).



> OH GOD JUST FIX IT was all the prompt I needed to write this, MildredMost! I'm sorry there isn't more recovery, but I swear up and down this has a happy ending—I hope you like it, and happy Yuletide. ♥
> 
> Title from [The Cremation of Sam McGee](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45081/the-cremation-of-sam-mcgee), because I'm just not principled enough to resist the opportunity. :D

 

 

_In the darkness, my hand touches his. I grab it. My chest is bursting. I'm trying to haul him upwards, but my fingers are numb, he slips out of my grip. Flailing, I strike a body. It isn't Gus. My hand clutches something soft as mouldy leather._

_I struggle. I kick myself free. Up to the surface, choking, spitting out seawater. I catch a choppy glimpse of the burning camp._

_Against the glare, a black figure stands watching on the shore._

 

 

* * *

 

 

_Later_

I don't understand.

I don't understand any of this. ~~The last few pages are~~

~~I didn't~~

Let me start again. I woke up, and for a minute I didn't know where I was. I was expecting a cabin on the _Isbjørn_ , I suppose. Or maybe a sickhouse somewhere. Longyearbyen, or even England. As if I might mercifully have slept away the choice to truly leave Gus behind.

~~We could have gone back for him. I could have made them turn around, I should have~~

But I woke up, and I was in the cabin. I'm in the cabin. The words on the last few pages are all strange – the writing doesn't look like mine, so sharp and jagged and wild. The last few lines are almost unreadable.

But they're true. Aren't they? I remember it – I remember all of it. That's exactly how it happened, everything, the fire, the cabin, the boat.

Gus.

I remember. But here I am, sitting on the edge of my bunk in a cabin that hasn't burned down, with Isaak whining and nosing at my knee. I'd almost think I'd dreamed it.

But I just woke up. When could I have written it down?

 

 

 

It did this.

That's the only explanation I can come up with. I don't know how long I spent pacing, except that it was long enough for Isaak to give up following me back and forth – by the end he was just lying on the floor with his chin on his paws, following me with his eyes instead.

I checked everything in the cabin, and it's all just as it should be. Nothing out of place, nothing so much as blackened round the edges. Even the Eddystone – dry, since I'd mopped up after the melt that had ruined it. So at least that part really did happen.

It did this. That's all I can think. Wanting me to understand that even if they do come for me, a price will be paid. Wanting me to await even the prospect of rescue with dread, because now I know what's coming.

There must have been a moment when the trapper understood, after all. When one of the miners pulled the first knife, before the blade ever touched him. Did they tell him what they were going to do to him? Did they talk about it, egging each other on, before they started cutting?

God.

There has to be something I can do, some way to stop it from happening like that. I can admit it, here, in these pages, even if I'll never tell anyone: I'd forgotten about the frost. I went and sat at the Eddystone for at least an hour before I remembered, tapping out messages to no one at all. _DONT COME DONT COME NOT GUS NOT GUS DONT COME_

Obviously that won't work. I need to think.

I've read those few strange pages again and again, trying to treat them like Gus's natural history book – trying to look at what they say objectively, without feeling it all again. And I wasn't prepared. I think that's what it comes down to. The torches, the lamps. I was so focused, mindless animal desperation, on light.

But that's foolish. There is no light here. As if I could call the sun back to me with ten thousand feeble imitations. It makes me think of some of the things I've read – the rituals people used to do, sacrifices and litanies and prayer, just to ask the sun to rise again the next day. It used to seem silly to me; the books I read it out of all thought so, with that faint supercilious tone civilization gets when it looks back on its former selves.

Now I understand why they did it. But I can't make the sun rise here, not with a hundred paraffin lamps, and I can't let myself go crazy trying.

I need to keep a clear head. In the dream, the vision, whatever it was – I wasn't ready, when it came for me. I didn't have my coat to hand. I went out without boots, without mittens. It's a lucky thing I didn't forget Isaak, I was so panicked.

I need to do better. If I can just get into the boat more quickly, keep Isaak calm and Gus away from the wale, then surely the rest will change.

 

 

 

I can't stop thinking about it. I've been trying to sleep, but every time I close my eyes I'm back there again: in the frigid cold, the close dark, that terrible moment of realization when I recognized the dim red eye of the stove in front of me and knew I'd gone the wrong way.

And all the time, that presence. Knowing it had got inside, feeling the horrible weight of all that malevolent will, and that moment when I touched it

Had to get up and go wash my hands for a minute. I've got a pot of meltwater – lukewarm, just about, or at least it's warmer than my hands were when I first put them in it. Clean, clear, and I didn't stay wet long enough for the skin to prune up.

Probably never will again, if I live.

If. That might have been the point, I'm starting to think. Of seeing all that, of it showing that to me. I wanted to live and to get away so badly. It hadn't occurred to me that there would be a cost.

And what if it just goes on like that? What if I can't ever really get away? Losing Gus like that, when I know it was me that thing wants. How would I ever leave that behind, even if I get away from Gruhuken?

If it happens, if Gus comes – maybe all I need to do is make sure I'm the one who stays in the sea.

 

 

 

_2nd December_

Already given everything away, just writing that. I know what day it is again.

Can't write long. It's my hands. Doctor says they'll be all right, most likely. Murder holding a pencil, though. Didn't lose any fingers, but they're red & black & peeling up all over.

Point is: boat came. Just like I saw. Cabin fire, though I meant it to happen this time around. Remembered my boots, too – toes are OK. So is Isaak.

Gus OK, too.

Gus OK.

I could write that 200 times. But then I probably would lose some fingers. Maybe just once more, though.

Gus OK.

 

 

 

_11th December_

I got into a spot of trouble with the doctor for writing at all, even that short little entry. But I'm doing better now, and made such a nuisance of myself that he finally folded and gave me this journal back. I had to promise to write only "in moderation". Whatever that means.

I just want to get it all down before I can forget. Not that I'm likely to, but writing it out – it helps me get it all straight. It was a funny kind of comfort, in the worst of the dark, having the old entries to go through. All my past selves, keeping me company. Echoes.

Anyway. I suppose I did get the most important parts down, didn't I?

The boat came. The fire, too. I started it this time, though. I don't know. I couldn't just leave the cabin. I couldn't bear the thought of anyone else coming to Gruhuken, seeing it standing there and thinking they could stay, thinking it was shelter.

The rest happened just like the dream. It was so strange – I felt seized by it, carried along. I tried to tell Gus not to get out of the boat, I _wanted_ to, but my throat wouldn't work. Like Cassandra, except not: he might have believed me, if only I'd been able to get the words out. But I was half out of my head, and it all felt so inexorable.

I made it into the boat, and if it was a dream the first time, I'd done a truly spectacular job imagining precisely how Gus's hands would feel against my back, the warm steady weight of them, the low soothing sound of his voice in my ear. It was all just the same.

It was all just the same, down to that wet dark head rising out of the water. I cried out, I think, shouted something and grabbed onto Gus. (I've seen his wrists, since, and it turns out I left bruises.) Isaak was panicking, thrashing, but Algie was sitting next to Gus; he caught Isaak before he could go over the side.

I don't want to write it. I wish it weren't so.

But I saw it. The boat lurched, with Isaak throwing his weight around, and Algie caught him and had to come up out of his seat so Isaak wouldn't tip him over. He was leaning against the wale, and he crouched and braced his boot against the side as he tried to get Isaak to settle in the bottom of the boat, and then he was in the water.

Someone who didn't know about the thing in the water might have said he slipped, I suppose.

I'd leaned so far over to clutch at Gus that I was right there. I could see him, his white face against the dark water, his hands reaching up.

And he must have been able to see me. He must have been able to see the moment when I thought about letting him drown.

It was only an instant. I'd never be able to look at myself in the mirror again, otherwise. But my head was full of the dream, and for a moment I thought – I'd already decided not to let it be Gus. But maybe it didn't have to be me, either. Maybe it could be Algie. And something dark and dreadful inside me murmured, _I never liked him anyway_. For that instant, I would have done it. I would have let the sea swallow Algie, if only it let me and Gus alone.

But Gus shouted, and I remembered myself. Of all the ridiculous things to think, Gus and his perfect face, noble and distressed – _Boy's Own_. That's where my bleary half-mad mind went, and whatever else was wrong with me, I still had the sense to know that no _Boy's Own_ hero would let a fellow drown alone in a dark sea.

And of course I couldn't let Gus touch the water.

So I threw myself at the wale and grabbed after Algie. That's why my hands are like this, now. Better than Algie, who Gus says is like this in plenty more places.

I haven't been to see him. I'm not sure I could look him in the face.

The thing is, I don't think the trapper is entirely alone, there on Gruhuken. Remembering the way Algie got with the dogs, talking about breaking their teeth, or with the seal he'd skinned – that easy casual cruelty that had flared up in him, inexplicable. I think the miners are lingering, too. Maybe just the trapper's memories of them, the way they seemed to him, and not their real selves. I don't know.

Maybe the ghost of that sick callous indifference worked its way inside me, too, and not just Algie.

Or maybe I just want to think it did, because that way it won't have been me.

 

 

 

_14th December_

Algie forgives me.

I still haven't gone to see him. But Gus does, and Gus comes to see me, and today he told me Algie forgives me.

He seemed a bit confused by it, and after he'd passed the message along – very precisely, so I can only imagine Algie made him swear to repeat Algie's own words exactly – he waited for me to take my hand off my eyes, and then said, "Oh, Jack, what does he mean? I thought you'd want me to ask, but you look as though you already know."

He touched my shoulder, steady and reassuring, and I fought not to let it warm me. Not now, not while I should be thinking of what I'd nearly done to Algie.

He's been like that all this while I've been in hospital. He hardly left me in Longyearbyen, or at least every time I can remember waking, I recall looking for his face and finding it. And here, in England, he's come every day.

I might be pleased about it, even cautiously hopeful, if I thought I deserved it.

But if Algie really does forgive me, then perhaps I'm not so thoroughly damned as all that.

But I've gone off track. Gus asked, and I quailed. I didn't want to tell him the truth.

But I couldn't lie, either. Not about this.

"I made a mistake," I told him. "I was frightened and selfish, and I made a mistake. That's what he means."

Gus didn't quite look as though he believed it, and I dare to think it was for the best of reasons; I still remember that last telegram of his. _JACK YOU ARE SO BRAVE._

But he only squeezed my shoulder and said, "All right. All right, Jack, don't worry. I won't press." Which was about when I realized I was clutching his wrist, and my hand was shaking.

I swallowed and looked away and muttered something inane, I can't even remember what it was.

And Gus stayed where he was, kept that steady warm hand on my shoulder; and gradually my fingers relaxed enough that I was able to make myself let go of him.

Even then, he didn't move his hand. He looked at me and then away, and blew out a slow breath. And then he said softly, "Jack. Jack, I'm so sorry we left you there."

I couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't make a sound. Now, here, when everything is safe and light and warm again – some part of me still felt that to speak of it would make it real again, that whatever traces still clung to me would be strengthened and sink down roots. And yet I was desperate to hear him say it, too. To have someone acknowledge even a fraction of the horror that had so consumed me.

"I'm so sorry," he said again, almost a whisper. "You shouldn't have been alone. I know you don't believe it now, but – oh, Jack, you _are_ brave."

As if he'd thought of the telegram just then, too. It felt good, that we should have shared that memory and that impression, that we should both think of it again at the same moment. It felt like a connection.

Because I had been alone, but I wasn't anymore.

I'm not alone anymore.

 

 

 

_16th December_

Gus was back again.

Today was the first time I thought to feel self-conscious about it – about how much time he's taken up, coming to the hospital every day like this, and Christmas nearly here.

But when I said as much, he laughed. He shook his head and grinned at me, cheeks pink, and I think I missed at least half of whatever he said next, just staring at him.

Then he bit his lip and hesitated, and said, "There's nowhere else I'd rather be, anyway."

Needless to say, I was pretty useless after that. I'd have been glad enough just seeing him again, just knowing I hadn't let him be dragged under the sea at Gruhuken. But he's come every single day. He always seems so pleased to see me, always apologizes when visiting hours end and he has to leave. The doctors are still working with me on the movement in my hands – the left worse than the right, or I probably wouldn't even be able to write. But Gus doesn't mind when I complain, when I'm sour with the pain of it. Not even when I doze off right in the middle of his visits.

He's so kind and warm and _Gus_.

I thought I loved him before, but now I'm sure.

We talked about Christmas, today. I apologized for not having a gift for him, which made him laugh again, and then he got an odd nervous look on his face and asked whether I'd mind getting one of mine early.

Well, naturally I wasn't going to refuse him.

The nurse wanted to load me up in a chair like an invalid, but Gus smiled and ducked his head and was terribly charming, and she relented and let him walk me out. The room where I've been recovering is in nearly the middle of the hospital, so it's a bit of a walk to the stairs. But Gus kept his arm around me the whole way, so I wasn't worried about falling.

Fainting, maybe. But not falling.

And I didn't realize until he opened the door and led me out into the hospital courtyard. Because of where my room is, it doesn't have any windows.

But today, the sun was shining.

"It's been rotten weather for _days_ ," Gus was saying beside me, "really wretched. I didn't know if we'd get sun at all before Christmas. But it cleared up a bit this morning. And I thought – I thought you'd like to see."

It was weak sad English sun; it was the best thing I've ever felt. I settled my hands on his shoulders so I could close my eyes, tilt my face up into the light and feel it against my cheek. And when I opened my eyes again, the very first thing I saw was Gus, right there, smiling at me.

And for the first time in months, I was warm.

 

 


End file.
